I guess now that Kieran Tierney has actually left Celtic Park, in spite of his protestations of love and loyalty, John McGinn feels that this is a good time to profess his own affections for the club he turned down the chance to play for in the first place.
But frankly, I was rather hoping that he would continue to do us the courtesy of supporting from afar and in relative quiet.
I have to be honest, I think it’s a little weak that these stories are coming out now when it’s been a whole year since he turned down the opportunity to move here and signed for Villa instead.
In all that time he’s expressed no regrets.
And he’s not expressing any regrets now.
I am honestly baffled as to why some people care about McGinn as though he were a Celtic player out on loan elsewhere.
He will never pull on the club’s shirt, and Tierney never will again.
I know some people, for whatever reason, hold out the hope of that … but neither of those things is going to happen and nor should they.
We move forwards, not backwards.
David Moyes, too, is having his say on the coming campaign, the man who could have been Celtic manager but for one or two problems, the first being that he just isn’t that good. He is another who talks a lot about an affection for the club but when approached in the past has never been terribly enthusiastic about the idea of actually being here.
During the summer, when speculation was rife, the furthest he would go was to say he was “keeping his options open” – which meant, in truth, that he was still hoping for career rehabilitation in England. Now his best bet is the MLS, and the realisation that he’s no longer rated.
So of course, this is a good time to remind all of us about his pro-Celtic credentials.
Just in case, you know?
All of it means the sum total of nil.
It should be in the rear-view mirror as we go into tonight.
The only important people are those who are actually at Celtic Park and working to make us as strong as we can be.
The rest is background noise, and that’s where it should be kept.
We have business to attend to, and the only folk most of us are interested in are those who are going to be out on the park and actually wearing the Hoops.